Codes of Ethics in Public Health

Ethics in public health were distilled into a professional code relatively recently, with adoption of a code by the American Public Health Association (APHA) a little more than 10 years ago. In that short time, however, the code has influenced standards for public health practice and education. A few organizations representing disciplines within public health, such as the Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) and the American College of Epidemiology (ACE), have written ethical guidelines specific to their professions and consistent with the APHA Code of Ethics. Codes related explicitly to public health ethics in countries other than the US have yet to be written.